A visitor walks through the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin, Germany, on May 7, 2015. A ceremony was held here on Thursday to mark the 10th anniversary of the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. (Xinhua/Zhang Fan)
BERLIN, Jan. 26 (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called for keeping the memory of the Holocaust alive and showing zero-tolerance to anti-Semitism and hatred.
In her latest podcast speech published on Saturday, one day before the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Merkel said this day reminds us what racialism, hatred and enmity can do.
"During the period of National Socialism, millions of people were deprived of their rights, tortured, tortured and murdered," says Merkel, referring to the German government's commitment against anti-Semitic and misanthropic incitement.
Every single person in society has the task "of taking responsibility for showing zero tolerance for anti-Semitism, misanthropy, hatred and racial delusion, said Merkel, who added that "unfortunately that is of great urgency in our time".
Merkel referred to the Office of the Federal Government Commissioner for the fight against anti-Semitism, which was created in 2018, and to the planned nationwide reporting center for anti-Semitic attacks.
"Because today we see very different forms of anti-Semitism: on the one hand, the hatred of Jews by the local population, but also by immigrant Muslim people who express this hatred in a very different way again."
In 2018 a number of anti-Semitism cases, including an attack against a kosher restaurant in the east city of Chemnitz following xenophobic protests after a German was killed by refugees.
"We have to remember the victims of National Socialism so that history never repeats itself," said Merkel, who added that it is particularly important to commemorate, also because there will be fewer and fewer eyewitnesses.
The Jan. 27 marks the 74th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp set up by the Nazi Germany.
In 2005 the day was marked by the United Nations General Assembly as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day to commemorate the tragedy occurred during WWII that about 6 million Jewish people and millions of Slavs, Poles, Romani people and others.
