Yom HaShoah Opening Ceremony At Yad Vashem (Video And Photo Essay)

By BJLIfe/Sharon Altshul
Posted on 04/17/23

Jerusalem, Israel - Apr. 17, 2023 - Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day, is being observed on April 17 - 18, 2023, with thousands of events throughout Israel.

The official State Opening Ceremony is held at Yad Vashem, with simultaneous translation into English, French, German, Hebrew, Russian Spanish, and Arabic. This year the program marked 80 years since the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

In Warsaw Ghetto Square of Yad Vashem, on the Mount of Remembrance in Jerusalem. Israel’s President Isaac Herzog and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered remarks. Dani Dayan lit the Memorial Torch.

A long list of dignitaries and Israeli government officials attended as they do each year. Special attention was given before the program started to the arrival of Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran's former leader Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Former President Reuven Rivlin greeted Pahlavi and commented on how much he looked like his father whom he met in 1978.

New this year, people arriving early before the 8:00 pm televised program on the theme of Jewish Resistance during the Holocaust, were able to go to the Hall of Remembrance and light a memorial candle.

Each year during the ceremony, Holocaust survivors are honored to light six torches. This year: First torch - Tova Gutstein; second torch - Ben-Zion Raisch; third torch - Judith Sohlberg; fourth torch - Robert Bonfil; fifth torch - Efim Gimelshtein; sixth torch - Malka Rendel.

During the ceremony, short videos about each of the torch lighters were shown. Produced and directed by Shlomo Hazan, these videos are available on the Yad Vashem website in the section dedicated to  Holocaust Remembrance Day 2023.  

Shoshana Weis (née Schapira) spoke on behalf of the survivors and was born in 1934, in Vatra Dornei, Romania. At the war's end when family members returned home, not bearing the lingering antisemitism, she immigrated to Israel alone in 1948. Shoshana completed her law studies and became an educator.

The program concluded with Chief Rabbi David Lau reciting a pasuk tehilim and The Rishon LeZion Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef saying kaddish.

El Maleh Rahamim was announced to be by Efraim Mol, born in 1938, in a suburb of Brussels, Belgium. His long story of survival, from an orphanage to a French family, includes coming to Israel as a lone soldier. He worked in an Israeli defense industries factory and continued to serve in the IDF combat reserves, fighting in all of Israel's wars until the First Lebanon War. After retiring, he became a sofer. However, he is in the hospital after suffering a recent stroke. His son Yoel Mol and grandson were present and requested people pray for Efraim.

Singer Shuli Rand who earlier in the program sang "Who by Fire" also di El Maleh Rahamim.

It was warmer weather than usual on the mountain top where some years the winds and cold require winter clothing for the ceremony.