Yom HaShoah
2020 date: sunset, April 20 – nightfall, April 21.
Yom Hazikaron laShoah
ve-laG'vurah (Hebrew: יום הזיכרון לשואה ולגבורה, lit. 'Holocaust and Heroism
Remembrance Day'), known colloquially in Israel and abroad as Yom HaShoah (יום השואה)
and in English as Holocaust Remembrance Day, or Holocaust Day, is observed as
Israel's day of commemoration for the approximately six million Jews who
perished in the Holocaust as a result of the actions carried out by Nazi
Germany and its collaborators, and for the Jewish resistance in that period. In
Israel, it is a national memorial day. The first official commemorations took
place in 1951, and the observance of the day was anchored in a law passed by
the Knesset in 1959. It is held on the 27th of Nisan (falls in April or May),
unless the 27th would be adjacent to the Jewish Sabbath, in which case the date
is shifted by a day.
Origins: The first Holocaust Remembrance Day in Israel
took place on December 28, 1949, following a decision of the Chief Rabbinate of
Israel that an annual memorial should take place on the Tenth of Tevet, a
traditional day of mourning and fasting in the Hebrew calendar. The day was
marked by the burial in a Jerusalem cemetery of ashes and bones of thousands of
Jews brought from the Flossenbürg concentration camp and religious ceremonies
held in honor of the victims. A radio program on the Holocaust was broadcast that
evening. The following year, in December 1950, the Rabbinate, organizations of
former European Jewish communities and the Israel Defense Forces held memorial
ceremonies around the country; they mostly involved funerals, in which objects
such as desecrated Torah scrolls and the bones and ashes of the dead brought
from Europe were interred. In 1951, the
Knesset began deliberations to choose a date for Holocaust Remembrance Day. On
April 12, 1951, after also considering as possibilities the Tenth of Tevet, the
14th of Nisan, which is the day before Passover and the day on which the Warsaw
Ghetto uprising (April 19, 1943) began, and September 1, the date on which the
Second World War began, the Knesset passed a resolution establishing the 27
Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, a week after Passover, and eight days before
Israel Independence Day as the annual Holocaust and Ghetto Uprising Remembrance
Day. On May 3, 1951, the first officially organized Holocaust Remembrance Day
event was held at the Chamber of the Holocaust on Mount Zion; the Israel Postal
Service issued a special commemorative envelope, and a bronze statue of
Mordechai Anielewicz, the leader of the Warsaw Ghetto revolt, was unveiled at
Yad Mordechai, a kibbutz named for him. From the following year, the lighting
of six beacons in memory of the six million Jews killed by the Nazis became a
standard feature of the official commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day. On
April 8, 1959, the Knesset officially established the day when it passed the
Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day Law with the purpose of instituting an
annual "commemoration of the disaster which the Nazis and their
collaborators brought upon the Jewish people and the acts of heroism and revolt
performed." The law was signed by the Prime Minister of Israel, David
Ben-Gurion, and the President of Israel, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi. It established that
the day would be observed by a two-minute silence when all work would come to a
halt throughout the country, memorial gatherings and commemorative events in
public and educational institutions would be held, flags would be flown at half
mast, and programs relevant to the day would be presented on the radio and in
places of entertainment. An amendment to the law in 1961 mandated that cafes,
restaurants and clubs be closed on the day.
Commemoration:
Israel:
Date: The date is set in accordance with the Hebrew
calendar, on 27 Nisan, so that it varies in regard to the Gregorian calendar.
Observance of the day is moved back to the Thursday before, if 27 Nisan falls
on a Friday (as in 2021), or forward a day, if 27 Nisan falls on a Sunday (to
avoid adjacency with the Jewish Sabbath, as in 2024). The fixed Jewish calendar
ensures 27 Nisan does not fall on Saturday.
Evening: Yom HaShoah opens in
Israel at sundown in a state ceremony
held in Warsaw Ghetto Square at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes
Authority, in Jerusalem. During the ceremony the national flag is lowered to
half mast, the President and the Prime Minister both deliver speeches,
Holocaust survivors light six torches symbolizing the approximately six million
Jews who perished in the Holocaust and the Chief Rabbis recite prayers.
Daytime: On Yom HaShoah,
ceremonies and services are held at schools, military bases and by other public
and community organizations. On the eve of Yom HaShoah and the day itself,
places of public entertainment are closed by law. Israeli television airs
Holocaust documentaries and Holocaust-related talk shows, and low-key songs are
played on the radio. Flags on public buildings are flown at half mast. At
10:00, an air raid siren sounds throughout the country and Israelis are
expected to observe two minutes of solemn reflection. Almost everyone stops
what they are doing, including motorists who stop their cars in the middle of
the road, standing beside their vehicles in silence as the siren is sounded.
Abroad: Jewish communities and individuals throughout
the world commemorate Yom HaShoah in synagogues as well as in the broader
Jewish community. Many hold their commemorative ceremonies on the closest
Sunday to Yom HaShoah as a more practical day for people to attend, while some
mark the day on April 19, the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. Jewish
schools also hold Holocaust-related educational programs on or near Yom
HaShoah. Commemorations typically include memorial services and communal vigils
and educational programs. These programs often include talks by Holocaust
survivors (although this is becoming less common as time passes and there are
fewer survivors who remain alive), candle-lighting ceremonies, the recitation
of memorial prayers, the Mourner's Kaddish and appropriate songs and readings.
Some communities read the names of Holocaust victims or show Holocaust-themed
films. Since 1988 in Poland, a memorial service has been held after a
3-kilometer walk by thousands of participants from Auschwitz to Birkenau in
what has become known as "The March of the Living".
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