In a strongly-worded and emotionally charged speech to a major Jewish group in honor of Holocaust Remembrance Day, President Donald Trump commemorated the victims of the Holocaust, emphasized the need to remember the genocidal atrocity, and celebrated the modern state of Israel as a symbol of Jewish perseverance.
“On Yom HaShoah, we look back at the darkest chapter of human history,” Trump began, using the Hebrew phrase for Holocaust Remembrance Day, which falls on April 24. “We mourn, we remember, we pray, and we pledge: Never again. I say it, never again.”
His powerful comments, delivered passionately in strong language, came in a pre-recorded video address to an assembly of the World Jewish Congress on Sunday.
“On this Holocaust Remembrance Day, we tell the stories of the fathers, mothers and children, whose lives were extinguished and whose love was torn from this earth,” Trump stated.
He then went on to praise the courage, humanity, and “unbreakable spirit of the Jewish people.”
“Today, only decades removed from the Holocaust, we see a great nation risen from the desert and we see a proud Star of David waving above the State of Israel,” he declared.
“That star is a symbol of Jewish perseverance. It’s a monument to unyielding strength.”
Trump then turned to the modern message of the Holocaust, speaking about today’s threats to Jews and the Jewish state and including an oblique reference to Iran. “In the memory of those who were lost, we renew our commitment and our determination not to disregard the warnings of our own times,” he said.
“We must stamp out prejudice and anti-Semitism everywhere it is found. We must defeat terrorism, and we must not ignore the threats of a regime that talks openly of Israel’s destruction. We cannot let that ever even be thought of.”
He concluded with a strong message of American-Israeli solidarity and thanked his audience for helping to fulfill “the dream of Israel for millions, a dream that burned in the hearts of oppressed and fallen, and which now draws the breath of life from a joyous people each and every day.”
Watch the full video:
