First official visit to the Holy Land
Westerwelle and Netanjahu
(photothek/Thomas Imo)
Federal Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle is now in the Middle East.With Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanjahu he held his first political talks in Jerusalem. Before leaving he had emphasized the “special responsibility” Germany bears towards Israel as well as its backing for all efforts to breathe new life into the Middle East peace process.
Westerwelle expressed his support for a “just two-state solution”, noting that Israel had a right to secure borders and the Palestinians a right to their own state. Germany is committed to the so-called Road Map, which envisages inter alia an Israeli freeze on all settlement activities. According to Westerwelle, “that is not only the German Government’s view, that is also the view of the whole international community”.
Close friendship with Israel
The first leg of the Federal Foreign Minister’s two-day trip was Jerusalem, where he had a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanjahu. The main focus of the talks was the Middle East peace process, how to manage the economic and financial crisis and Iran’s nuclear programme. Westerwelle made clear he was opposed to Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. Such a prospect was totally unacceptable to the international community, he noted.
Westerwelle rekindling the Eternal Flame at Yad Vashem
(photothek/Thomas Imo)
Visit to Yad Vashem to pay tribute to the victims of the Shoah
The first day of Westerwelle’s programme in Israel also included a visit to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust commemoration site. Together with Charlotte Knobloch, the President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, the Federal Foreign Minister was taken on a guided tour of the Holocaust History Museum on the Mount of Remembrance in Jerusalem. Knobloch had joined the Minister as his guest on his visit to Israel.
In the Hall of Remembrance, the focal point of commemoration at Yad Vashem, Westerwelle laid a wreath and rekindled the Eternal Flame dedicated to the memory of the Shoah’s victims. The floor of the Hall is engraved with the names of 22 of the largest concentration camps. Before the Eternal Flame stands a stone crypt containing the ashes of concentration camp victims.
After a minute’s silence Westerwelle visited the Children’s Memorial. In the Yad Vashem visitors book he wrote “We will not forget. Our responsibility remains – our friendship grows.”
Yad Vashem was founded in 1953 as a centre for Holocaust documentation, research, education and remembrance. The spacious complex contains museums, exhibitions, research centres and the world’s largest archive documenting the Holocaust. In the Hall of Names a computerized databank contains the names and life stories of Shoah victims and can be searched online.
Translated into English, Yad Vashem means “a place and a name” according to Isaiah 56,5: “Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off.”
In its first decades Yad Vashem had no relations with Germany. It was only in the 1990s that cooperation began on a variety of projects. Since 1999 the Federal Foreign Office, for example, has provided 5.9 million euro in funding for an archive project to locate and film documents relating to the persecution of Jews in the Third Reich.
“We will not forget”
(photothek/Thomas Imo)
German-Israeli intergovernmental consultations
In the evening Federal Foreign Minister Westerwelle met his opposite number Avigdor Liebermann. His talks in Israel are also intended to prepare the German-Israeli intergovernmental consultations to be held on 30 November in Berlin.
In 2008 the State of Israel celebrated the 60th anniversary of its founding. In this connection Germany and Israel on 17 March 2008 held in Jerusalem their first intergovernmental consultations. For Germany these were the first-ever consultations to be held with a non European country. Federal Chancellor Merkel and the then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert decided to expand relations between their countries and intensify cooperation particularly in the economic sphere as well as on research and innovation. They also agreed to promote intersocietal contacts and youth exchanges.
The German and Israeli foreign ministries have likewise expanded their cooperation:
2008 saw the launch of the German-Israeli Future Forum, whose work is aimed at bringing young people from both countries together in the context of joint projects.
In Haifa and Jerusalem German studies centres were established.
To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the State of Israel’s founding, Germany for the first time staged cultural weeks there.
In summer 2008 the Federal Foreign Office and the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs organized a joint summer academy for both countries’ trainee diplomats.
Last updated 23.11.2009
