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Mar

18

German Chancellor Merkel to Knesset: “filled with shame over Holocaust”


If Germans and Jews can speak this frankly in the presence of one another, there is no reason to think that Barack Obama’s speech today cannot be a similar watershed for Americans.

From Ynetnews.com:

“Standing here before you is a great honor,” said German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Hebrew, as she addressed the Knesset Tuesday afternoon.

“The Shoah fills us Germans with shame. I bow before the victims. I bow before the survivors and before all those who helped them survive,” she said, this time in German.

…

Merkel received a standing ovation from the MKs [members of the Knesset] in attendance at the conclusion of her speech.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the special Knesset session that “the close bonds of friendship between Germany and Israel are not regular relations between two nations.

“They carry the heavy weight of historical memory to which we are obligated. But this is exactly why they (also) contain power, sensitivity and substance that are unparalleled between any two nations in the international arena.”

Five MKs boycotted the session.

More on the historic nature of her visit to the Knesset and the argument over whether to let her speak German there or not.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 1:11 pm March 18th, 2008 in Culture, Foreign Affairs, Government, Jewish, Judaism, Politics 

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