The International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust
Yad Vashem will mark the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust through a range of events both in-person and online.
Chosen by the United Nations in 2005 to serve as International Holocaust Remembrance Day, 27 January is the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp in 1945. “Seventy-seven years later, the Holocaust still haunts us,” remarks Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan. “Today, as the world continues to battle expressions of hatred, antisemitism and xenophobia, the significance and lessons of the Holocaust are particularly relevant.”
Dayan will participate in Yad Vashem’s Annual Symposium for the International Diploamtic Corps Serving in Israel, together with Israel’s President Isaac Herzog and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Gideon Sa’ar. Also addressing the event is Ambassador Alon Ushpiz, Director General of Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, together with the Ambassador of Zambia and Dean of the Diplomatic Corps in Israel Martin Mwanambale. Yad Vashem Senior Historian Dr. David Silberklang will lecture on the topic “Holocaust Memory in Challenging Times,” and Director of Yad Vashem’s Artifacts Department Michael Tal will present several items in Yad Vashem’s Artifacts Collection that will be eventually housed in the new David and Fela Shapell Family Collections Center currently being constructed on the Moshal Shoah Legacy Campus.
The ambassadors will also hear the testimony of Kindertransport survivor Henry Foner, renowned author of “Postcards to a Little Boy” – a moving anthology that presents the illustrated postcards and letters sent by Foner’s father as well as other relatives and friends to the young refugee in the UK during the Shoah. The event, which will be conducted in English, will take place in the Edmond J. Safra Lecture Hall in Yad Vashem’s International School for Holocaust Studies on Thursday, 27 January beginning at 16:00.
Online
Yad Vashem has created a mini-site marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day, featuring a variety of resources the public can view, share and engage in, including online exhibitions, educational resources and the unique IRemember Wall.
Yad Vashem’s online commemorative project, the IRemember Wall, allows individuals to be randomly linked to one of the 4,800,000 Jews murdered in the Holocaust currently registered in Yad Vashem’s Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names. The participant’s name then appears on the IRemember Wall together with the name of the victim of the Holocaust. The user can also choose a specific name of a family member or anyone else from the Names Database with whom they wish to be matched.
Yad Vashem has also launched a new online exhibition, “Remember Your New Name: Surviving the Holocaust Under a False Identity,” for International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This exhibition sheds light on how some Jews survived during the Holocaust outside of the deathly ghettos, and forced labor, concentration and extermination camps. Many tried to save themselves and their families from persecution by using forged papers that provided them with false identities. For most, this was a daily battle for survival in a hostile environment, which required resourcefulness and the ability to adjust to constantly shifting circumstances.
WorldwideMembers of Yad Vashem’s senior staff, historians and eductors, including Yad Vashem Chairman Dani Dayan, will participate in various events and ceremonies around the globe marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Last week Yad Vashem partnered with the European Union Delegation in Israel for an event entitled “How to Talk about Auscwitz in 2022: Holocaust Commemoration Through Cinema.”
Dozens of Yad Vashem’s ready2print exhibitions will be displayed in community centers and institutions around the world, including locations in the United States, Brazil, Canada, Uruguay, Brazil, Great Britian, France, Spain, Germany, Russia, Rwanda, the Ivory Coast and India.
Additionally, starting on 27 January, the Israeli Embassy to the Holy See in Rome will be displaying Yad Vashem’s exhibition “Art From the Holocaust” at the Pontifical University in Rome for a month. The exhibtion will then travel to various dioceses until the end of April 2022.
