Impressive memorial services honoring the 6,000,000 European Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis were held today — the Fast of the Tenth Day of Tebeth, commemorating the first siege of Jerusalem — in all parts of Israel. The services were arranged under the auspices of the Ministry of Religion.
The principal service took place on historic Mount Zion, where Chief Rabbi Isaac Halevi Herzog and representatives of immigrant groups in Israel assembled hundreds of objects which had been fashioned from Scrolls of the Law by the Nazis. Rabbi Herzog and other participants in the rites covered themselves with ashes taken from a furnace symbolizing the destruction of the 6,000,000 Jews who died as martyrs for “Kiddush Hashem.”
Chanting the hymns composed in the ghettoes of Europe, the participants — led by Rabbi Herzog — entered a “Cellar of Anguish,” a cave on the mountainside, where they lit a specially-constructed 31-branch Menorah, symbolizing the 31 Nazi concentration camps in which Jews were put to death. Altogether, about 70 memorial services were held throughout the country.
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