2024-05-06 08:49:36
“If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone,” Netanyahu said.
Speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony at the Yad Vashem memorial in Jerusalem, the Prime Minister lamented that when the Nazis killed 6 million people during World War II, Jews, his people “could not defend themselves against those who sought our destruction.”
“No country helped us,” he said, speaking as an Israeli flag flew at half-mast and as Holocaust survivors prepared to light torches.
“Today we are once again facing enemies bent on destroying us,” Netanyahu told a large crowd at the ceremony.
One yellow chair stood empty, reserved for hostages still held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
“I say to world leaders: no pressure, no decision of any international forum will dissuade Israel from self-defense,” emphasized B. Netanyahu.
He expressed his regret at the worldwide criticism of Israel in connection with the war in the Gaza Strip, which began on October 7. an unprecedented attack by Hamas. The prime minister also condemned the “terrible volcano of anti-Semitism” raging around the world. At the same time, B. Netanyahu compared the protests in universities in the United States and other countries to the discrimination against Jews in German universities during the Second World War.
“What a perversion of justice and history,” he said.
The criticism, according to B. Netanyahu, is not “because of our actions, but because we exist… that we are Jews.” “You will not tie our hands… Israel will continue to fight human evil… until victory,” B. Netanyahu emphasized.
The current war in Gaza began after Hamas launched a bloody attack on Israel that killed more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures. The gunmen also took about 250 hostages in the attack – Israel believes 128 are still being held in the Gaza Strip, including 35 people the military says are dead.
After the attack, Israel vowed to destroy Hamas and launched a retaliatory offensive that has so far killed at least 34,683 people in the Hamas-controlled enclave, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
2024-05-06 08:49:36