By Aryeh Savir/TPS • 20 January, 2020
Israel is finalizing its preparation for the massive international event it will host in the coming days which will see the arrival of some 45 royals and monarchs, prime ministers, presidents and parliamentary leaders who will come to Jerusalem for the commemorating of the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
The Foreign Ministry is preparing to welcome the train of leaders arriving at the Ben Gurion International Airport, and the various security services are preparing to shut down large parts of the center of the capital ahead of the event.
The Knesset and Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein are preparing to host several heads of parliament and state, including US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
President Reuven Rivlin will likewise host several of the leaders.
Israeli officials are required to coordinate dozens of personal itineraries for each leader, a complex task in such a small country and even smaller city.
The main event on Thursday at Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center will include addresses from Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Emmanuel Macron, the Uk’s Prince Charles, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, and US Vice President Mike Pence.
Holocaust survivors will light a memorial torch and recite the Kaddish, the Jewish mourner’s prayer.
The event is officially being held under the auspices of the fifth World Holocaust Forum and under the title “Remembering the Holocaust, Fighting Anti-Semitism.”
“No one thought that within the lifetime of those who lived through the Holocaust would there be such a virulent reoccurrence of anti-Semitism. The attendance of some of the world’s most powerful leaders signals a commitment to keeping the Holocaust at the forefront of collective memory, helping to ensure the impossibility of such an atrocity from reoccurring in the future,” the Government Press Office stated.