Yesterday marked Yom HaShoah on the Jewish calendar, the Day of Commemoration for Those Who Perished, or Holocaust Remembrance Day. In 1951, the Israeli Knesset declared that the 27th day of Nisan is to be Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day, a day of commemoration for the Jews who perished and for those who showed resistance and heroism during the Holocaust. The day is the anniversary of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto uprising, in which seven hundred and fifty fighters fought the heavily armed and well-trained German Army. The ghetto fighters were able to hold out for nearly a month, but on May 16, 1943, the revolt ended.
Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Authority
As part of a continuing effort to honor the victims of the Holocaust, Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority, was established in 1953 by the Knesset. Yad Vashem also oversees the world-wide Holocaust memorial, “Unto Every Person There Is a Name,” a unique project designed to perpetuate the memory of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust by public recitation of their names on the Day of Remembrance.
Watch NPR.org for more on this day of remembrance.
