Israel marked Holocaust Remembrance Day 2012 on Wednesday with a series of solemn events and a siren blaring throughout the country to pay tribute to the six million Jews who died in the Holocaust.
Israel's Holocaust museum, Yad Vashem, was the centerpiece of the nation's commemoration, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Perez present at the ceremony.
In a speech to the crowd at Yad Vashem, Netanyahu said the Jewish people still face threats to their extinction more than 80 years after Adolf Hitler killed six million Jews in Europe.
Our enemies tried to bury the Jewish future but our future was born again in the land of our forefathers, here we built a base, and a new beginning of freedom, and hope and action, Netanyahu said, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
Netanyahu then turned to Iran, calling it an existential threat to Israel and world peace, Haaretz reported.
It is the world's responsibility to stop Iran securing nuclear weapons, he said.
The Yad Vashem ceremony included the lighting of torches by six Holocaust survivors, each one representing one million Jews killed in the genocide.
Click through the slideshow above to see photos of the solemn events marking Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lays a wreath during a ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012. Netanyahu rejected criticism of his likening of a nuclear-armed Iran to the Nazi Holocaust as improper, saying in an address to the country on Wednesday that "uncomfortable truths" must be aired. ReutersWorld War II veterans lay a wreath during a ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012ReutersIsrael's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pauses after laying a wreath during a ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012.ReutersIsrael's President Shimon Peres lays a wreath during a ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012ReutersPeople lay flowers on the name of the Drancy concentration camp during a ceremony entitled "Unto Every Person There is a Name" in the Hall of Remembrance at Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012ReutersA woman lays a flower on the name of the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz during a ceremony entitled "Unto Every Person There is a Name" in the Hall of Remembrance at Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012ReutersWomen hold flowers before laying them down during a ceremony entitled "Unto Every Person There is a Name" in the Hall of Remembrance at Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012ReutersA girl holds a flower during a ceremony entitled "Unto Every Person There is a Name" in the Hall of Remembrance at Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem, marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012.ReutersPeople attending a wreath-laying ceremony, stand still as a siren sounds nationwide marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance, at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem April 19, 2012ReutersIsraeli soldiers walk together before the start of a wreath-laying ceremony at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem marking Israel's annual day of Holocaust remembrance April 19, 2012.ReutersA man holds Israel's flag as he walks to the March of the Living to honour Holocaust victims in Paneriai near Vilnius April 19, 2012. The procession marched between the Paneriai railway station and the Paneriai memorial as part of the route covered by prisoners of the Vilnius ghetto to their deaths in Paneriai forest. More than 90 percent of Lithuania's pre-war Jewish population were murdered during the Nazi occupation, according to history sourcesReutersA woman holds Israel's flag as she attends the March of the Living to honour Holocaust victims in Paneriai near Vilnius April 19, 2012.ReutersA student places flowers near the memorial for Holocaust victims during the March of Living in Paneriai near Vilnius April 19, 2012.ReutersPeople attend the March of the Living to honour Holocaust victims in Paneriai near Vilnius April 19, 2012.Reuters
