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World Leaders Gather in Jerusalem 75 Years After HolocaustBy Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- World leaders gathered in Israel to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive and urge vigilance against hatred and intolerance at the global commemoration of the Jewish genocide.

Forty-nine delegations attended the fifth World Holocaust Forum in Jerusalem on Thursday, with Russian President Vladimir Putin and American Vice President Mike Pence among the leaders participating. The event marked the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp, the most notorious symbol of Nazi Germany’s World War II atrocities.

The conference, taking place for the first time in Israel, comes as anti-Semitic attacks are on the rise globally and ignorance about the Holocaust is deepening as its memory fades.

The latest annual data from the Anti-Defamation League showed attacks on Jews and Jewish institutions doubled between 2015 and 2018. At the same time, only 45% of nearly 11,000 Americans polled last year knew 6 million Jews perished in the Holocaust, according to the U.S.-based Pew Research Center. Approximately a third of the more than 7,000 Europeans in seven countries surveyed separately by CNN that same year knew “just a little or nothing at all” about the genocide.

The number of people who can bear witness is also rapidly dwindling. In Israel, the largest community of survivors, the figure is expected to fall by about half to roughly 100,000 by 2025.

The memory of the Holocaust, Putin said, “will only serve a lesson that will prevent it from ever happening again if it is preserved intact.” He called for a summit in 2020 of leaders of the United Nations Security Council’s permanent members -- Russia, the U.S., China, France and the U.K. -- saying the five powers have “a special responsibility for the preservation of civilization.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the occasion, as he often does at international gatherings, to draw a parallel between Nazi Germany and Iran. He called on all governments “to join the vital effort of confronting Iran,” a theme later echoed by Pence.

“The Jewish people have learned the lessons of the Holocaust -- to take, always to take, seriously the threats of those who seek our destruction,” Netanyahu said. And yet, he added, “I am concerned. I am concerned that we have yet to see a unified and resolute stance against the most anti-Semitic regime on the planet, a regime that openly seeks to develop nuclear weapons and annihilate the one and only Jewish state.”

Iran denies it seeks to build atomic bombs. Some of its leaders have spoken about Israel’s destruction.

Duda Boycott

Germany was represented at the forum by President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who recited a Jewish prayer in Hebrew and declared himself “moved” by the “miracle of reconciliation” after his country committed the worst crime against humanity in history. But with anti-Semitism at home still alive, Steinmeier said, “Germany’s responsibility does not expire. We want to live up to our responsibility. By this, dear friends, you should measure us.”

Notably absent from the gathering was Polish President Andrzej Duda, whose country was overrun by the Nazis at the outbreak of World War II and was home to six extermination camps, including Auschwitz.

Duda bowed out because he wasn’t allowed to address the conference while Putin was, amid a disagreement between the two leaders over their countries’ roles in World War II.

On the sidelines of the gathering, Netanyahu met with guests and pushed to win an Israeli-American backpacker’s release from a Russian prison.

Netanyahu has failed several times to persuade Putin to free 26-year-old Naama Issachar, who was caught with a small amount of hashish while transiting through Moscow and was sentenced to 7 1/2 years on a drug-smuggling conviction. But Putin and Netanyahu met with Issachar’s mother on Thursday amid Israeli media reports the sides are now near a deal.

Putin hinted that he intended to free Issachar, saying he told her mother “everything will be all right” and that the Kremlin ombudsman would visit her in prison later in the day.

Issachar’s imprisonment is a cause celebre in Israel, where she’s widely regarded as a pawn in a political game, and her release would give the premier a boost as he goes into March 2 elections dogged by his indictment on corruption charges.

The Israeli government’s provisional status after two inconclusive elections last year will make it tougher for Netanyahu to take advantage of the gathering to advance Israel’s agenda, according to Micky Aharonson, a former head of foreign relations at Israel’s National Security Council. “It is definitely not ideal and not optimal for Israeli policy making,” Aharonson said.

Some of the visitors, including Pence and U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, met with Netanyahu’s top political rival, former military chief Benny Gantz.

The prime minister will use the opportunity to try to rally opposition to the International Criminal Court’s plan to open an investigation into Palestinian claims that Israel has committed war crimes, the Haaretz newspaper reported.

In an interview broadcast this week on the Christian Trinity Broadcasting Network, Netanyahu said viewers should “ask for concrete actions, sanctions against the international court, its officials, prosecutors, everyone.”

(Updates with Steinmeier in 10th paragraph)

To contact the reporter on this story: Ivan Levingston in Tel Aviv at ilevingston@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lin Noueihed at lnoueihed@bloomberg.net, Amy Teibel, Tony Halpin

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