Israel remembers Holocaust victims

0 Comments | AFP, May, 2008

JERUSALEM (AFP) — Israeli Jews on Thursday stopped in their tracks for two minutes as sirens wailed around the country in memory of the Holocaust when six million Jews perished in Nazi death camps.

From the northern city of Haifa to Beersheba in the southern Negev desert, in Jerusalem and on every collective village kibbutz, sirens sounded at 10:am (0700 GMT) to mark the annual Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Day.

On hearing the signal, the vast majority of Israeli Jews stop what they are doing, whether at home or at work, drivers pull over to the side of the road and pedestrians stand still.

The two-minute pause in the day's activities is Israel's most visible event on Holocaust remembrance day, which began at sunset on Wednesday with an opening...