International Thousands at the "March of the Living" in Auschwitz
Thousands of people from various countries commemorated the victims of the Holocaust at the traditional "March of the Living" in Poland. In addition to around 80 survivors of the Shoah, Israeli hostages released from the Gaza Strip were also present.
24.04.2025, 15:42
SDA
The march, which is a good three kilometers long, leads from Auschwitz to Birkenau, the largest of the German extermination camps during the Nazi era.
80 years after the liberation of the camps, Israel's President Izchak Herzog and his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda took part in the commemoration. Herzog's delegation included the released hostages as well as relatives of people who are still being held in the Gaza Strip and victims of terrorism.
The starting signal for the march, which also led through the gate with the cynical inscription "Arbeit macht frei" ("Work sets you free"), came from a shofar horn, a ritual musical instrument.
The horrors of the Holocaust will never be forgotten or forgiven, said Eli Sharabi, who lost his wife, daughters and brother in the Hamas terror attack on October 7, 2023. "And yet every representative of the Oct. 7 delegation who came here is a triumph of light for the Jewish people and a reminder that the Jewish people will exist forever."
Israeli President Herzog said that after the Holocaust, everyone had sworn that nothing like this should ever happen again. Nevertheless, "59 of our brothers and sisters are still being held by terrorist murderers in Gaza in a terrible crime against humanity". He called on the international community to put an end to this crime against humanity.
The name Auschwitz has become a synonym for the Holocaust and the epitome of evil in people's minds around the world. The National Socialists killed more than a million people there alone, most of them Jews. Throughout Europe, they murdered around six million Jews during the Shoah.
