Polish, Israeli presidents meet before March of the Living
Polish President Andrzej Duda and his Israeli counterpart, Isaac Herzog, have met in the southern Polish town of Oswiecim, where Nazi Germans built and operated the infamous Auschwitz death camp during World War Two.
Before taking part in the March of the Living, an annual event commemorating Holocaust victims and survivors, the two presidents addressed the media.
Duda recalled that the Nazis had built the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp mainly to exterminate the Jewish population, leading to the murder of over one million Polish citizens, including Jews, Poles and Roma people.
Thanking Herzog for his attendance, the Polish president said the march was a demonstration of "a dramatic 'never again' call" against hatred, chauvinism antisemitism.
Herzog said the march testified to their commitment to fight antisemitism, adding that hatred towards Israel had risen recently.
He said that his and Duda's presence at the event was a reflection of a Polish-Jewish commitment to pursue a path to the future while remembering the past.
Herzog also praised the resumption of Israeli student visits to Poland, which were suspended in November 2023 in the aftermath of the Hamas attack on Israel a month earlier and the start of a broader Israel-Hamas conflict. In March last year, the Israeli Ministry of Education announced the youth trips to Poland would be resumed.
Young Israelis traditionally make educational trips to Poland which also include visits to former Nazi death camps where they pay tribute to the victims.
Herzog also used the opportunity to call on the international community to exert pressure on Hamas to release the remaining hostages abducted during the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack.
Duda said that during earlier talks with Herzog, he used the opportunity to reiterate Poland's support for a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine amid the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
He said Poland considered the two-state solution as "rational and offering hope for a durable and stable peace between the states and between the nations."
The march's traditional three-kilometre route leads from Auschwitz's infamous 'Arbeit macht frei' (Work Sets You Free) gate to the crematoria of the nearby Birkenau site.
The first March of the Living took place in 1988. In the following years it was held biannually, and from 1996 once a year. The most numerous event drew 20,000 participants from almost 50 countries, with past attendees including Polish and Israeli presidents and prime ministers, as well as representatives from various faiths.
The Germans established the Auschwitz camp in 1940, initially for the imprisonment of Poles. Auschwitz II-Birkenau was established two years later. It became the site for the mass extermination of Jews. There was also a network of sub-camps in the complex. The Germans killed at least 1.1 million people at Auschwitz, including about 960,000 inmates of Jewish descent.
The camp was liberated by the Red Army on January 27, 1945. In 1947, the camp site was declared a national memorial site. (PAP)
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