Israelis marked Holocaust Remembrance Day on Thursday with ceremonies and events across the country, honoring the memory of six million Jews murdered by the Nazis. The day's events began at 10am with two minutes of silence in memory of the six million, marked by a siren that was heard throughout the country and brought Israel to a standstill.
Following the two minutes of silence, a wreath-laying ceremony commenced at Warsaw Ghetto Square at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum. Then the ceremony "Unto Every Person There is a Name" was held both in Yad Vashem's Hall of Remembrance and at the Knesset.
In Poland at the Auswhitz-Birkenau Death Camp, over 10,000 people representatives from 40 countries across the globe, participated in the March of the Living.
IAF attacked four Hamas posts in Gaza as a response to over 10 mortar shells which were fired at Israeli troops operating on the Gaza frontier Thursday. No injuries or damage were reported in the latest cross-border exchange in a flare-up of violence. IDF tanks also returned fire, shelling nearby suspicious sites believed to be the source of the mortar launches.
Earlier in the day, the IDF revealed that it had discovered a Hamas terror tunnel burrowing into Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip. This tunnel, which is slated to be destroyed in the coming days, is 28 meters (90 feet) deep and was located just a few kilometers from the location of another tunnel discovered and destroyed last month.
The Shin Bet security agency revealed on Thursday that Israeli authorities arrested a Hamas member last month who provided information about the Gaza-based terror group's tunnel activities. Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided to convene an emergency meeting of the security cabinet on Friday, to discuss the escalation of violence.
Hours after his speech at the Massuah Institute for the Study of the Holocaust on Wednesday, which prompted a storm in the political system, Deputy IDF Chief-of-Staff Yair Golan clarified that he had no intention of comparing the IDF and Israel to the processes that occurred in Germany 70 years ago. After Golan's clarification, Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said he has complete trust in Golan. The clarification was released several hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to Ya'alon. Netanyahu demanded from Yaalon a clarification and an apology from Golan.
The night before at the ceremony Golan said "The Holocaust should bring us to ponder our public lives and, furthermore, it must lead anyone who is capable of taking public responsibility to do so," Golan said. "Because if there is one thing that is scary in remembering the Holocaust, it is noticing horrific processes which developed in Europe — particularly in Germany — 70, 80, and 90 years ago, and finding remnants of that here among us in the year 2016."