President Herzog Addresses the International Conference on Combating Antisemitism on International Holocaust Remembrance Day

President Herzog: “To deny the Jewish people—and only the Jewish people—the right to self-determination in their national home is antisemitism. Even if you are the mayor of the city with the most Jews outside of Israel”

On January 27, 2026, President Isaac Herzog delivered remarks on International Holocaust Remembrance Day at the Second International Conference on Combating Antisemitism in Jerusalem. The conference was organized by the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism at the initiative of Minister Amichai Chikli and was attended by the Prime Minister of Albania, Edi Rama, and other international leaders.

President Herzog’s remarks:
“I would like to take a moment to relate to a hugely significant development for all of us in Israel and for millions around the world. Yesterday, after 834 days of anguished anticipation, Staff Sgt. Ran Gvili was returned to Israel. Ran, who didn’t hesitate for a moment on October 7th, running directly into the line of fire to protect his country, his fellow citizens, and fellow human beings, has come home at last. His return signals a significant turning point. For the first time since 2014, not a single Israeli citizen, living or dead, is being held as a human bargaining chip in Gaza.

“Eighty-one years ago today the gates of Auschwitz opened, and the world gazed into the darkness of pure evil. Here and now we gather in Jerusalem—eternal symbol of the Jewish people, of truth and of peace, and capital of the independent State of Israel, the nation-state of the Jewish people, the only one on Earth—to act upon that ‘sacred duty of all people of goodwill,’ to remember and to bear witness. To open our hearts to the grief of the past. We are here to add our voice to the eternal vow: ‘Never Again.’

“The Holocaust was the single greatest catastrophe in the history of humanity and in the history of our people. And, yet, it was upon those ashes of unthinkable destruction that a deep cry emerged. An outcry for repair, healing, and justice. An outcry for fraternity, cooperation, and building. It was an outcry that emerged not only from the depths of mankind. But from the grieving, tortured bellies of individual men and women. Women and men, who dedicated their lives to reversing the torment that had been inflicted upon them and their generation by crafting a world where they could never again come to pass.

“The fact is that a mere eighty-one years following the sacred vow of ‘Never Again,’ we are witnessing the unraveling of the very moral architecture that the best of our human conscience has labored so deeply to put into place.

“When hatred once again has become a legitimate form of political activism; When Jews feel compelled to hide their identities on the streets of London and Paris; When Jewish children must be escorted by armed guards to the school in the morning, and Jewish worshippers must be protected on Saturday mornings from Toronto to Boston to Buenos Aires; When we watch the blood of Jewish worshippers being spilled in Manchester on Yom Kippur; when we mourn the innocents massacred at a Hanukkah celebration in Sydney; when Jewish students at universities across the United States and Europe are isolated, alienated, and harassed for being Jewish, for being Zionist, for being who they are—it is clear: we are failing to meet our vow.

“The same old plague has been let loose on our societies once again. The rationale may be different, but it is the same ancient poison. It has taken many forms but has always carried the same name: antisemitism. Let us call it what it is. Let us state clearly: To deny the Jewish people—and only the Jewish people—the right to self-determination in their national home is antisemitism. Even if you are the mayor of the city with the most Jews outside of Israel! And how we respond to it truly matters.”